Author
Topic: Stat Check -- Turnovers (Read 1044 times)

Great job by the captain tonight, anticipating and at times inviting the double and triple teams. For the most part, every time he was doubled, he passed off to an open man rather than try to dribble through or around them. That is how you cut down turnovers and win games. Way to go, captain!

Great job by the captain tonight, anticipating and at times inviting the double and triple teams. For the most part, every time he was doubled, he passed off to an open man rather than try to dribble through or around them. That is how you cut down turnovers and win games. Way to go, captain!

Paul Pierce has 50 turnovers this year, only 5 fewer than Rajon Rondo who has the ball in his hands almost all of the time. Pierce needs to stop handling the ball. He is an absolute turnover machine and that is killing this team.

Pierce can still go to the hoop and he can still get a lot of shots, but he absolutely should not be handling the ball and trying to dribble by guys outside the arc. I know Pierce is not a point guard, but he has 62 assists and 50 turnovers! Besides Rondo, no one else is in the same stratosphere has Pierce.

I'm sending you an application for a Coaching position. Doc can't man up to a Pierce because he doesn't have the credentials. A coach can't be a diaper changer.

Paul Pierce has 50 turnovers this year, only 5 fewer than Rajon Rondo who has the ball in his hands almost all of the time. Pierce needs to stop handling the ball. He is an absolute turnover machine and that is killing this team.

Pierce can still go to the hoop and he can still get a lot of shots, but he absolutely should not be handling the ball and trying to dribble by guys outside the arc. I know Pierce is not a point guard, but he has 62 assists and 50 turnovers! Besides Rondo, no one else is in the same stratosphere has Pierce.

Pierce handles the ball a lot because besides Rondo there is no one else who can be trusted with the ball. The fact that he turns over the ball a lot is in part due to him being double- and triple-teamed by opponents. This makes sense as a defensive strategy.

I came to this thread hoping for a little bit deeper statistical dive.

No need to be deeper. Think this clearly shows that Pierce is a turnover machine and need to handle the ball less.

I don't think it proves that at all. Reading some of these posts, one would think that Paul is averaging about four turnovers a game. In fact, he's averaging 2.6 turnovers a game with an A/TO ratio of about 1.27 per game. While I'd love to see those numbers improve, these are by no means atrocious numbers for a high usage, top small forward.

For comparison, here are some numbers of some other top small forwards:

Good job. This shows Pierce is right in the same range as these other top SFs who have the ball in their hands frequently, not much better or worse.

That said, I have no problems with JET handling the ball more, but he clearly is still learning how to fit in with this team. When Rondo is on the court, Terry plays the 2 so it's more like Ray Allens role when he was here -- spot-up 3s coming off picks.